Tag: Jesse Matthew

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Matthew given three life sentences for attempted Fairfax murder

Jesse Matthew was given three life sentences on October 2 for attempted capital murder, abduction with intent to defile and sexual penetration with an object of a Fairfax woman in 2006. Staff photo/mugshot Charlottesville Police

Amidst screams from his sobbing mother who says she hopes the judge “rot[s] in hell,” Jesse Matthew was given three life sentences today for sexually assaulting a 26-year-old Fairfax woman while attempting to rape and kill her in September 2005. C-VILLE did not attend the sentencing, but followed live tweets by news organizations and reporters in attendance.

Matthew was convicted of this crime in June after DNA collected from the 2014 murder of UVA student Hannah Graham matched the DNA investigators found under the Fairfax victim’s fingernails. Matthew is charged with the capital murder of Graham.

In this case heard at the Fairfax County Circuit Court by Judge David Schnell, Matthew was charged with attempted capital murder, abduction with intent to defile and sexual penetration with an object.

During the June trial, the victim testified against her attacker in a chilling account that gained much media attention, saying she was just steps away from her front door when he picked her up and dragged her to a grassy patch nearby. She said she fought back as he beat her and sexually assaulted her, many media outlets reported. According to the Washington Post:  “He said, ‘I will kill you if you scream again’…He said, ‘Let me do this, and I’ll let you go,” she said.

On the third day of the Fairfax trial, Matthew entered an Alford plea, not confessing to the crime but admitting the jury had enough evidence to convict him.

In a letter to the judge made public on September 29, an alleged former girlfriend of Matthew who used the name “Diana” said Matthew was sexually abused by at least three different people in his childhood. During the hearing, prosecutor Ray Morrogh said the letter from Diana was hard to verify and deemed it irrelevant to the case.

Morrogh called Matthew a modern day Jekyll and Hyde, as reported by WTOP’s Neal Augenstein, and the prosecutor used words like “ruthless,” “remorseless,” “merciless,” “pitiless,” and “heartless,” to describe him, other news organizations and reporters tweeted conglomerately.

Matthew declined to give a statement.

Defense attorney Robert Frank described Matthew as a “kind, considerate, shy, socially awkward, gentle giant,” and asked the judge not to consider his charges in Charlottesville.

Earlier this week, a trial for the 2009 murder of Virginia Tech student Morgan Harrington, of which Matthew is also charged, was scheduled for October 24, 2016.

Related links:

Jesse Matthew enters Alford plea in Fairfax

Jesse Matthew to appear in Fairfax court

Motions in Jesse Matthew trial to be filed under seal

Harringtons’ day in court: Jesse Matthew indicted for Morgan’s slaying

 

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Motions in Jesse Matthew trial to be filed under seal

Jesse Matthew was given three life sentences on October 2 for attempted capital murder, abduction with intent to defile and sexual penetration with an object of a Fairfax woman in 2006. Staff photo/mugshot Charlottesville Police

At a previous motions hearing, Judge Cheryl Higgins allowed police to unshackle Jesse Matthew’s belly chain, freeing his hands to only handcuff restraints. Nonetheless, in a September 30 hearing, Matthew appeared, once again, with handcuffs attached to his belly chain, making it difficult for him to raise his right hand when he waived his rights to a speedy trial for charges of the murder of Morgan Harrington.

The trial was set for October 2016, just three months after Matthew will face capital charges for the abduction and slaying of UVA student Hannah Graham.

The defense had asked Higgins to recuse herself in the Graham case because she has a daughter who is a UVA student. Judge Higgins disclosed in the Harrington portion of the hearing that her second daughter goes to Virginia Tech, where Harrington was also a student.

Higgins also heard motions by defense attorney Doug Ramseur and denied all but one, allowing the defense to file motions under seal, giving the public no access to the motions until the time of the motions hearing. The commonwealth’s responses will be kept under seal, as well.

“The reporters who are covering this are certainly invested,” Ramseur said, adding that every motion he files gets reported and it could affect Matthew’s right to a fair trial. He also stated that motions potentially involving the names of witnesses raised serious concerns because he does not want the media to contact witnesses before the trial.

Higgins denied the defense’s’ request for Matthew to undergo a prison violence risk assessment by a professional, as well as the request for all grand jury information such as identities and addresses, and selection processes for the grand jury over the past four years.

After the motions hearing and scheduling for the Morgan Harrington trial, Gil Harrington, her mother, said she approached Matthew’s mother, offered her condolences and shook her hand.

“It’s very surreal to be here as many times as we’ve been here,” Harrington said. “You become habituated to the obscenity of it.”

Matthew is scheduled to be sentenced in Fairfax on October 2 for a 2005 sexual assault of which he is also convicted.

“We’ll obviously be interested in what happens,” said Commonwealth’s Attorney Denise Lunsford after the September 30 hearing, “but that’s a separate case in a separate jurisdiction.”

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Unusual motion filed in Jesse Matthew case

Commonwealth's Attorney Denise Lunsford requests for a partial denial of the motion for Jesse Matthew to appear unshackled and in his own clothes in public. Photo: Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The defense for Jesse Matthew Jr., now on trial for the murder of University of Virginia student Hannah Graham, filed three motions to the Albemarle Circuit Court September 8. While two of the three motions are frequently seen in cases where the death penalty is sought, the defense’s third is a rarity.

Graham went missing a year ago on September 13, after being last seen with Matthew. Her body was discovered more than a month later in North Garden, and Matthew faces capital murder charges in Albemarle County.

His defense, in addition to requesting that Judge Cheryl Higgins be removed from any rulings related to search warrants and requesting a prison violence risk assessment, filed a motion requesting the identities and addresses of members of the grand jury for the past four years.

C-VILLE’s legal expert David Heilberg says of the unusual motion, “I’ve not seen it in any kind of case, not even a death case until now.” Heilberg adds that while there are case laws preventing racial discrimination for the selection of a regular jury, these laws do not apply to the grand jury.

“We don’t know what the constitutional procedures are [for the grand jury],” Heilberg says. “The laws are very flexible. … They seem to be designed to get indictments.”

Heilberg suggests that if this weren’t a capital case, only a wealthy defense would pursue the same motion.

“It’s an attempt to slow the machinery of death,” he notes. “It’s intended to slow or stop the death process or to create leverage to negotiate. That’s really what it’s aimed at.”

If the motion proves unconstitutional practices in the grand jury selection process, Heilberg says it would likely only result in a delay in Matthew’s case.

“I think all that could happen is that they would try to constitute the grand jury in a different way and then they would reindict him,” Heilberg explains. “He’s not going anywhere at this point.”

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Harringtons’ day in court: Jesse Matthew indicted for Morgan’s slaying

Gil and Dan Harrington face a media crush outside Albemarle Circuit Court. Staff photo

Nearly six years after 20-year-old Virginia Tech student Morgan Harrington disappeared from a Metallica concert at John Paul Jones Arena, her parents sat within feet of the man accused of abducting and killing her.

Jesse Leroy Matthew Jr., 33, was arraigned September 16 in Albemarle Circuit Court for first-degree murder and abduction with the intent to defile, one day after a grand jury indicted him. Gil and Dan Harrington were in close proximity to Matthew, who had been expected to be arraigned by video conference.

“It was not menacing and scary, but it was brazen,” said Gil Harrington about seeing Matthew in the courtroom.

It wasn’t the first time she’d been in the same courtroom with him. She’s been present at the hearings for the Hannah Graham case, for which Matthew is charged with capital murder. She was present in June for his trial for attempted capital murder, abduction with intent to defile and sexual assault stemming from a brutal 2005 attack in Fairfax.

And she was present last year at the trial for the murder of another missing girl, Alexis Murphy, 17, in Nelson County, for which Randy Taylor was convicted.

But this is the first time Gil and Dan Harrington had been in court to see charges brought against the alleged killer of their daughter.

Morgan Harrington was last seen October 17, 2009, on the Copeley Road bridge near JPJ Arena. Years before the disappearance of Hannah Graham became a national news story, hundreds turned out to search for Harrington, and for months after she vanished posters plastered the area. Her body was found in January 2010 in a field on a farm off U.S. 29 south of Charlottesville.

In the ensuing years, the Harringtons never seemed to give up hope that Morgan’s killer would be found. Every year on the anniversary of her disappearance, they commemorated the date on the Copeley Road bridge. They founded an organization called Help Save the Next Girl because they were convinced Morgan’s killer was still out there and they wanted to make young women aware of predators.

A few months after she was found, the Harringtons first learned of a link to the 2005 Fairfax assault and saw a drawing of the man identified by the victim.

That link didn’t lead to Matthew until September 13, 2014, when 18-year-old UVA student Graham allegedly crossed paths with Matthew on the Downtown Mall, and was never seen alive again. Her body was found in October 2014, also south of town just a few miles from where Harrington was found.

“We’ve known for some time we share a bizarre link with the Grahams,” said Gil Harrington after the hearing.

In court, Matthew’s capital lawyers in the Graham case, Doug Ramseur and Michael Hemenway, were appointed to represent him in the Harrington case.

Commonwealth’s Attorney Denise Lunsford said afterward she has no plans to join the two cases nor to seek capital charges in Harrington’s death.

“I’m not sure it matters now,” said Dan Harrington outside the courthouse. “I think it’s an incredible relief for us. It’s a very emotional day.”

“He’ll never hurt anyone else now,” said Gil Harrington.

She also thanked the media for not saying, “Oh, another pretty girl, too bad,” while covering the case. And she hugged reporters Ted Strong, a former Daily Progress reporter now with the Richmond Times-Dispatch, and former C-VILLE Weekly editor Courteney Stuart, both of whom have covered the case for years.

“We’re six years out and we’re still going strong,” said Gil Harrington. “We need to find a new rhythm and pace as we switch to a new marathon.”

–with additional reporting by Samantha Baars

This article was updated at 3:50pm September 16.

 

It's been six years since Morgan Harrington disappeared. She was linked to Jesse Matthew a year ago.

Jesse Matthew indicted in Morgan Harrington slaying

Nearly six years after 20-year-old Virginia Tech student Morgan Harrington disappeared from a Metallica concert at John Paul Jones Arena, an Albemarle County grand jury has indicted Jesse Leroy  Matthew Jr. for first-degree murder and abduction with intent to defile. Both charges carry penalties of up to life in prison.

Matthew, 33, who is currently being held at Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail, was served with the indictments September 15. He is facing capital murder charges in the death of 18-year-old UVA student Hannah Graham, who vanished September 13, 2014. Her body was found in the woods south of Charlottesville in October.

In June, Matthew was convicted of attempted capital murder, abduction with intent to defile and sexual assault stemming from a brutal 2005 attack in Fairfax.

Virginia State Police had confirmed a forensic link that tied Matthew to Harrington, who was last seen October 17, 2009, and whose body was found several months later in a field at a farm south of town, a few miles from where Graham later was found.

Matthew, a Monticello High grad, will appear in court by video at 12:45pm September 16.

 

Related links:

http://www.c-ville.com/discovery-remains-new-charges-jesse-matthew-offer-hope-closure/

http://www.c-ville.com/leaked-search-warrant-reveals-dna-link-harrington-case/

http://www.c-ville.com/accused-hannah-graham-abductor-indicted-fairfax-sexual-assault/

http://www.c-ville.com/jesse-matthew-pleads-not-guilty-victim-testifies-fairfax-case/